Translators From Rome

"I could not pray, if I did not believe; but if I really believed, I should cleanse that heart of mine with which God is seen, I should beat my hands upon my breast, the tears would stream down my cheeks, my body would shudder, my face grow pale, I should lie at my Lord's feet, weep over them, and wipe them with my hair, I should cling to the cross and not let go my hold until I obtained mercy. But, as it is, frequently in my prayers I am either walking in the arcades, or calculating my interest, or am carried away by base thoughts, so as to be occupied with things the mere mention of which makes me blush."

"It is not the sheep only who abide in the Church."

"No one can take to himself the prerogative of Christ, no one before the day of judgment can pass judgment upon men. If the Church is already cleansed, what shall we reserve for the Lord?"

"Let them not flatter themselves if they think they have Scripture authority for their assertions, since the devil himself quoted Scripture, and the essence of the Scriptures is not the letter, but the meaning. Otherwise, if we follow the letter, we too can concoct a new dogma and assert that such persons as wear shoes and have two coats must not be received into the Church. (Matt 10:10)"

"A quo et affixus cruci, martyrio coronatus est, capite ad terram verso, et in sublime pedibus elevatis: asserens se indignum qui sic crucifigeretur ut Dominus suus."

"Hic ergo quarto decimo Neronis anno, eodem die quo Petrus Romae, pro Christo capite truncatur, sepultusque est in via Ostiensi, anno post passionem Domini tricesimo septimo."

"Just as divorce according to the Saviour's word was not permitted from the beginning, but on account of the hardness of our heart was a concession of Moses to the human race, so too the eating of flesh was unknown until the deluge. But after the deluge, like the quails given in the desert to the murmuring people, the poison of flesh-meat was offered to our teeth. … At the beginning of the human race we neither ate flesh, nor gave bills of divorce, nor suffered circumcision for a sign. Thus we reached the deluge. But after the deluge, together with the giving of the law which no one could fulfil, flesh was given for food, and divorce was allowed to hard-hearted men, and the knife of circumcision was applied, as though the hand of God had fashioned us with something superfluous. But once Christ has come in the end of time, and Omega passed into Alpha and turned the end into the beginning, we are no longer allowed divorce, nor are we circumcised, nor do we eat flesh."

"Diogenes maintains that tyrants do not bring about revolutions in cities, and foment wars civil or foreign for the sake of a simple diet of vegetables and fruits, but for costly meats and the delicacies of the table. And, strange to say, Epicurus, the defender of pleasure, in all his books speaks of nothing but vegetables and fruits; and he says that we ought to live on cheap food because the preparation of sumptuous banquets of flesh involves great care and suffering, and greater pains attend the search for such delicacies than pleasures the consumption of them. … Persons who feed on flesh want also gratifications not found in flesh. But they who adopt a simple diet do not look for flesh. … The soul greatly exults when you are content with little: you have the world beneath your feet, and can exchange all its power, its feasts, and its lusts, the objects for which men rake money together, for common food, and make up for them all with a sack-cloth shirt."

"Dicæarchus in his book of Antiquities, describing Greece, relates that under Saturn, that is in the Golden Age, when the ground brought forth all things abundantly, no one ate flesh, but every one lived on field produce and fruits which the earth bore of itself."

"Xenocrates the philosopher writes that at Athens out of all the laws of Triptolemus only three precepts remain in the temple of Ceres: respect to parents, reverence for the gods, and abstinence from flesh. Orpheus in his song utterly denounces the eating of flesh. I might speak of the frugality of Pythagoras, Socrates, and Antisthenes to our confusion: but it would be tedious, and would require a work to itself. At all events this is the Antisthenes who, after teaching rhetoric with renown, on hearing Socrates, is related to have said to his disciples, «Go, and seek a master, for I have now found one.» He immediately, sold what he had, divided the proceeds among the people, and kept nothing for himself but a small cloak. … His most famous follower was the great Diogenes, who was mightier than King Alexander in that he conquered human nature."

"To be deceived is the common lot of both layman and bishop."

"Amicum qui diu quaeritur, vix invenitur, difficile servatur."

"Caritas non potest conparari; dilectio pretium non habet."

"Amicitia quae desinere potest vera numquam fuit."

"Facilius enim neglegentia emendari potest quam amor nasci."

"Libet, sarcina corporis abiecta, ad purum aetheris evolare fulgorem. Paupertatem times? sed beatos Christus pauperes appellat. Labore terreris? at nemo athleta sine sudore coronatur. De cibo cogitas? sed fides famem non timet. Super nudam metuis humum exesa ieiuniis membra collidere? sed Dominus tecum iacet. Squalidi capitis horret inculta caesaries? sed caput tuum Christus est. Infinita eremi vastitas te terret? sed tu paradisum mente deambula. Quotiescumque illuc cogitatione conscenderis, toties in eremo non eris."

"Si rivus tenuiter fluit, non est alvei culpa, sed fontis."

"Cum subito raptus in spiritu...."

"Asino quippe lyra superflue canit."

"Nisi quod in se habet mordacis aliquid veritatis."

"Ita se natura habet, ut amara sit veritas, blanda vitia existimentur."

"Et sicut viri fortes in controversiis solent facere, culpam praemio redimerem."

"Non confundant opera tua sermonem tuum: ne cum in Ecclesia loqueris, tacitus quilibet respondeat, cur ergo haec quae dicis, ipse non facis?"

"Nemo invito auditori libenter refert. Sagitta in lapidem nunquam figitur, interdum resiliens percutit dirigentem."

"Facile contemnitur clericus, qui saepe vocatus ad prandium, ire non recusat."

"Negotiatorem clericum, et ex inope divitem, ex ignobili gloriosum quasi quandam pestem fuge."

"Ne hoc quidem scire quod nescias."